Walter Hergenhahn

Grave of Walter Hergenhahn in the main cemetery in Frankfurt

Walter Hergenhahn (born June 14, 1904 in Frankfurt am Main ; † March 30, 1980 there ) was a German artist and director of the Städel evening school.

Life

After graduating from high school in 1923, Hergenhahn completed a one-year apprenticeship at a bank and then studied painting and drawing at the Städelschule from 1924 to 1929 with FK Delavilla and Max Beckmann . He spent some time in Paris in the early 1930s . Like his teacher Beckmann, Hergenhahn was persecuted by the National Socialists as a "degenerate" artist and from 1933 onwards was banned from exhibiting. The artist retired to the island of Sylt in the years up to 1939 . Drafted in 1939, he became a soldier and was eventually taken prisoner of war. Many of his works were lost or destroyed in the chaos of war.

In 1947 Hergenhahn was one of the founders of the artists' association “ Neue Gruppe Rheinland-Pfalz ” in Nierstein am Rhein . From 1951 to 1953 he taught painting and drawing in Mainz . A few years later he took over the teaching of the evening school at the Städelschule, the State University of Fine Arts in Frankfurt am Main. He stayed there until the 1970s. His students included Gerd Kehrer , Jürgen Wölbing and Renate Neumann .

Web links

• Hergenhahn, Walter. Hessian biography. (As of November 25, 2019). In: Landesgeschichtliches Informationssystem Hessen (LAGIS).